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Episode 275: JDL Pinball

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·41m 33s·analyzed·Aug 17, 2020
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TL;DR

JDL Pinball founders discuss European pinball growth, streaming operations, and tournament safety during COVID-19.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Dina and Jim Lindsay of JDL Pinball, a European streaming and tournament organization. The discussion covers their origin story (meeting in Siberia, relocating to Germany), the explosive growth of German pinball competition, their streaming operations at major European events (IFPA 16, Pinball Alps), and COVID-19 safety protocols for tournaments. They discuss emerging young talent like Paul Englert (age 13, 23rd world ranking) and top players like Johannes Ostermeyer.

Key Claims

  • German pinball tournaments grew from 2-3 major events in 2010 to approximately 120 major tournaments by 2020

    high confidence · Jim Lindsay directly states: 'When we started in 2010, there were two or three major tournaments in the country... And last year, I think it was about 120.'

  • Paul Englert is 13 years old and currently ranked 23rd in the world

    high confidence · Jim states: 'He's 13 years old' and Jeff earlier references him as '23rd in the world'

  • IFPA 17 World Championship was originally scheduled for May, then November in Florida, and is now being pushed to 2021

    high confidence · Jeff states: 'IFPA 17 got moved. It was originally supposed to be in May. Then it was supposed to be in November in Florida. Now it's being pushed to next year.'

  • IFPA 18 was originally scheduled for Germany at Freddy's Pinball Paradise but has been postponed to 2022

    high confidence · Jeff states: 'IFPA 18, which was supposed to be in Germany at Freddy's Pinball Paradise, that is now obviously going to be postponed until 2022.'

  • Dina and Jim met in Siberia approximately 13 years ago when Jim was working in the coal mining equipment supply industry

    high confidence · Jim states: 'We actually met in Siberia... 13 years ago now' and describes working in 'the coal mining industry, equipment supply'

  • Pinball clubs in Germany must operate as charities to avoid 40 euros per machine per month entertainment tax

    high confidence · Jim states: 'you pay entertainment tax, which is 40 euros per machine per month. So, pinball clubs... will have to be a charity. Therefore, it's the only way to actually function.'

  • The German Pinball Open in Gladbeck in 2016 featured approximately 120 machines recovered from private collections

    high confidence · Jim states: '120 pinball machines that were recovered from people's barns, people's cellars, people's attics'

  • JDL Pinball's first stream was the German Pinball Open in Gladbeck in 2016

Notable Quotes

  • “I can understand what you say, but I can only answer you in German.”

    Dina @ Early in conversation — First words Dina said to Jim at their meeting in Siberia; illustrates the beginning of their relationship

  • “Having spent most of her life working to get Dina out of Siberia, you can imagine her feelings when I employed Dina and sent her back.”

    Jim Lindsay @ Early biographical section — Humorous recounting of employing Dina immediately after she moved to Germany to escape Siberia

  • “When we started in 2010, there were two or three major tournaments in the country... And last year, I think it was about 120.”

    Jim Lindsay @ Mid-conversation, discussing German pinball growth — Demonstrates the tenfold increase in German tournament activity, key metric of pinball growth

  • “The most difficult one we found was the match play score entry and the display of the players for the next round... the tendency was people to be so keen to see their name... to not be as conscious of the distance”

    Jim Lindsay @ COVID-19 safety protocols discussion — Practical insight into pandemic tournament management; identifies specific crowding concern

  • “He's 13 years old... He's quite small in stature. And probably when you saw him... he was still using a box to stand on, which, of course, everybody then underestimates his capability and he wipes them out.”

    Jim Lindsay @ Discussion of Paul Englert — Characterizes rising young talent and how physical stature affects tournament perception

  • “It's the hand-eye coordination, it's the timing. it's the juggling, if you will, of maybe multi-balls... drumming is a great skill set, I believe, to help you with pinball.”

    Jeff Teolis @ Discussion of Dina's drumming hobby — Theorizes connection between musical rhythm skills and pinball performance

  • “Everything that came from a Western country was pretty much banned... The only band that was really popular in the Soviet Union was The Beatles, because it was not to be sort of hidden.”

Entities

JDL PinballorganizationDina LindsaypersonJim LindsaypersonJohannes OstermeyerpersonPaul EnglertpersonTobias WegermanpersonPinball AlpseventIFPA 16eventIFPA 17event

Signals

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Positive reception to JDL Pinball's COVID-19 safety protocols among German tournament participants; protocols include temperature testing, contact tracing, hand sanitizer stations, and machine distancing (1-in-3 operation)

    high · Jim reports trial tournament success with 'feeling of everybody was that of safety' and detailed safety measures; trial was limited to 25 players to test safety feasibility

  • ?

    community_signal: JDL Pinball selected to stream major IFPA events (IFPA 16, IFPA 18, European Pinball Championship) based on reputation and country director recommendations; volunteers named forward due to established credibility

    high · Jim: 'Josh Sharp... asked the tournament, the country directors of Europe, if anyone could stream in Italy... a few of the country directors put our names forward'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Four-player match play creates social distancing challenges in pandemic conditions; two-player games maintain better distancing compliance; participants voluntarily mask during crowded play

    high · Jim observes: 'Four-player games, you get the other three players congregating too close together... lots of players in the four-play match actually put masks on' vs. two-player games where 'lots of people didn't'

  • $

    market_signal: German pinball has experienced explosive growth and now hosts major international tournaments comparable to North American circuit; 'whopper farm' model of multi-tournament weekends created to allow European players to accumulate IFPA ranking points competitively

    high · Jim: 'German pinball has seen, has increased tremendously... tenfold increase' from 2-3 to 120 major tournaments; Jeff notes 'massive, what people call whopper farms in the sense that there's just so many different tournaments'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.125

0:00
it's time for another pinball profile i'm your host jeff teal so you can find everything on pinballprofile.com check out our facebook group don't forget about twitter and instagram at pinball profile and you can email us pinballprofile at gmail.com who says you can't go anywhere with covid i'm going to germany right now because that's where i kind of wanted to go this summer. If not this summer, it'll have to be next summer or maybe the summer after. Maybe it'll be an annual trip because there's some exciting pinball there. And you know that because you've seen what Dina and Jim Lindsay have brought to the pinball competition world with JDL Pinball and they join us right now. Hello, Dina. Hello, Jim. Hi, Jeff. Hi, everybody. It is good to talk to you again. It was just a few weeks ago that we were talking when you were live in Switzerland. That was a lot of fun at the Pinball Alps competition. That was amazing and thank you for coming on our show on that side So it's great that you've invited us back on yours as well, Geoff Well, I'm a big fan of what you do And we're going to get into some of the great streams that you've done But I have to ask right off the bat How does this man from England and this woman from Russia meet in Germany? Well, we actually met in Siberia, it's where I'm from And for work, so I was doing at the time a lot of work in Russia I work in the coal mining industry, equipment supply, and I basically was working with a partner company in a town called Camaropo. I needed an interpreter for an exhibition, and this company had just employed Dina, and they sent Dina down to the exhibition to meet me. And the first thing she said was, I can understand what you say, but I can only answer you in German. Okay, we're getting closer, but you give a new meaning, by the way, to partner company when you're talking about business and meeting your partner. But okay, that's fine. So that was how many years ago now? 13 years ago now.
2:02
But, you know, we were just friends and business partners for a few years. And then I moved to Germany with my mother because we have German roots. And my mom applied for moving to Germany. So we got there, and obviously it's quite difficult when you're new in the country to find a job. And then Jim said, well, you valuable workforce, stop lounging about and employed me for his company in England. And then send me back straight to where I come from. Straight to Siberia. And her mother, we're obviously very good friends now, we've known each other for a long, long time. But having spent most of her life working to get Dina out of Siberia, You can imagine her feelings when I employed Dina and sent her back. What a guy, and you're still together. Yes, well. Okay, so you are from Siberia, and you had never seen a pinball machine, but you have a pinball connection in that you love the band The Who and obviously the movie Tommy and that pinball connection. So how did this all come about with you, Jim, and with you, Dina? How did pinball come into your life? Well, I heard of pinball from Jim because he mentioned that, you know, talking about his youth and things, but I didn't have any reference point to it whatsoever because I've never seen a pinball machine and never played one. And it's only through seeing or watching Tommy the film for the 50th time, like pretty much straight after talking to Jim about it, I thought, well, I now actually have a reference point and I would really like to go and play some pinball. And the closest tournament that we found was the German Pinball Open, which was exactly 10 years ago, in 2010. 2010, yeah. So, yes, and we went there, entered the tournament, did quite well. We didn't come last, which is good. And I got to know lots of people from England, from Germany, and sort of started developing the friendships from there.

high confidence · Jim states: 'we streamed the GPO in Gladbeck as our very first event in 2016'

Dina @ Discussion of music availability in Soviet Union — Provides cultural context for Dina's background and access to Western music

  • “People have to be comfortable. People have to feel safe. And if they don't, then they don't play. It's up to us to try and create that.”

    Jim Lindsay @ COVID-19 safety discussion — Expresses philosophy of voluntary participation and organizer responsibility in pandemic conditions

    • IFPA 18
    event
    German Pinball Open (GPO)event
    Bulls and Ballsvenue
    Pinball Universevenue
    Richmond Pinball Collectivevenue
    Freddy's Pinball Paradisevenue
    Josh Sharpperson
    The Whoentity
    Tommyproduct
    Elton Johnperson
    Rick Wakemanperson
  • ?

    event_signal: European Pinball Championship (EPC) in Belgium expected to move from 2020 to 2021

    high · Jim states: 'we were scheduled to do in Belgium we're expecting now that to be moved by a year and so therefore we will be doing the EPC in 2021'

  • ?

    event_signal: IFPA 18 postponed from Germany (Freddy's Pinball Paradise) to 2022 due to IFPA 17 delay cascade

    high · Jeff states: 'IFPA 18, which was supposed to be in Germany at Freddy's Pinball Paradise, that is now obviously going to be postponed until 2022'

  • ?

    event_signal: IFPA 17 World Championship postponed from May to November in Florida, then pushed to 2021 due to COVID-19 and international border restrictions

    high · Jeff directly confirms multiple schedule changes and explains: 'Even if the borders were open, people would come from all over the world to the U.S. and they wouldn't be able to leave because not too many countries are accepting people from the U.S.'

  • $

    market_signal: German pinball venue economics heavily influenced by 40 euro/month/machine entertainment tax; forces club operation as charities; commercial venues (Pinball Universe, Bulls and Balls) positioned as sustainable models

    high · Jim: 'you pay entertainment tax, which is 40 euros per machine per month. So, pinball clubs... will have to be a charity. Therefore, it's the only way to actually function'

  • ?

    community_signal: Johannes Ostermeyer (World #1) given streaming kit equipment by JDL Pinball to encourage content creation during transition to college; represents investment in player development and content ecosystem

    high · Jim states: 'We, as JDL Pinball, have actually given him a streaming kit to try and encourage...'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Paul Englert, age 13 and ranked 23rd globally, represents new generation of competitive pinball talent; operates independent YouTube channel (Pinsheep) for gameplay content; capable of extended high-scoring sessions (1+ hours single game)

    high · Jim: 'He's 13 years old... His dad supports him... Paul has a YouTube channel called Pinsheep... he got like an amazing score on the Ninja Turtles, like in one game, one hour, 20 minutes'

  • ?

    technology_signal: COVID-19 accelerating product development in telecommunications and video streaming technology; JDL Pinball planning technology upgrades for IFPA 18 in 2022, anticipating significant hardware/capability improvements in two-year window

    medium · Jeff speculates: 'the technological leap in two years' time is probably going to allow us to have like space shuttle cameras or, you know, like really high-tech' and Jim confirms: 'the technology is developing a lot faster now because communication in these times, well, telecommunication in particular, is incredibly important'

    • 4:10
    I'll fill in a bit of the story briefly from my side. I lived in a town called Doncaster, which is in the north of England, and I used to play pinball when I was a lot younger and was always sort of reasonably good. It's something I did when I should have been at school. and I used to play in my local pub in Doncaster and they had a machine there that had a monthly competition which I used to go in at the beginning of the month and put a sort of half-decent score on and then go in two days before the tournament finished and wipe off whatever score anybody had managed to achieve and won maybe £30 or £40. Then they took that pinball machine out of the pub and I thought, oh, this is odd. And then kicked you to Germany. I can't believe that for winning an audition. She said, you're not playing here anymore. You have to leave England straight away.
    5:01
    So that's what actually made me look for pinball outside of Doncaster. And I found pinball across the UK and got quite involved in the league scene and things there. And then found international pinball. And that's where it all started from. That was back in about, oh, 2000. Well, it was 2010 from that GPO. So quite amazing. Was there a lot of pinball in England? Because I know in London it was difficult for me at the time when I was there to find pinball. Yes, England has leagues in different areas, so Northern League, London Pinball League, probably about eight or ten leagues across the country. They have a league final every year, and they also used to hold the UK Open. It used to be held in Daventry near Nottingham, central England. that was this last year in 2019 held in London run by Neil McRae and some others who I think you know I definitely know what Neil's done he's done some amazing things there and really grown pinball in England for sure so in Germany though I mean over the last few years let's just say all of us North Americans have noticed wow look at all these great not only German players they've always been there and we'll talk about some of those in a second, but a lot of great German tournaments. I mean, the Olympics, we're going to be talking about bowls and balls and some of the things that they do and the Ho-Ho event and all these massive, what people call whopper farms in the sense that there's just so many different tournaments that you can really pad your IFPA ranking. Certainly, you'll get a lot of experience. Well, yes, German pinball has seen, has increased tremendously. When we started in 2010, There were two or three major tournaments in the country and a few more sort of smaller ones, like 32 people. And last year, I think it was about 120. Wow. Which was, I think, a tenfold increase. And, you know, you combine all the balls and balls and events and won as well. So lots of venues. There have been lots of clubs and, well, kind of pinball clubs in Germany are kind of a charity. Otherwise, you pay entertainment tax, which is 40 euros per machine per month. So, pinball clubs like, for example, Richmond Pinball Collective, sort of similar venue, will have to be a charity. Therefore, it's the only way to actually function. But there are some commercial venues like Balls and Balls and Pinball Universe, which is the dealership of Stern Pinball. and I think Zelligenstadt is a commercial venue as well. It's a pinball museum and they have slightly bigger spaces, they have more machines and they play tournaments on a more regular basis. And the demand is there, so we have absolutely no problem filling in a tournament with 100 people within a few minutes after registration. So I assume access to pinball machines is pretty easy. You mentioned some of the distributors. I know other places in the world sometimes have to wait for shipments to come, but as far as Europe is concerned, and especially Germany, I saw this firsthand with that Pinball Alps tournament done in Switzerland. There was every new game possible there. I couldn't believe it. I guess that's part of the excitement for the players and for the leagues to see these new games come out and get their hands on them. Yeah, and Pinball Universe will generally put machines on location.
    8:34
    So Bulls and Balls is a flipper location for PU, and so they support them. They will also rent machines for use on a particular event. But mentioning the big Whopper tournaments and everything, the Olympics and the ho-ho-ho, the person we really have to credit for this is Tobias Wegerman. Tobias, our country director, along with a sort of group of inner people we humbly belong to, has been responsible for the expansion, the explosion, if you like, of pinball within Germany and the international acclaim that he now has. Let's talk about Tobias for a little bit. I have yet to play against him. I know who he is. He's 45th in the world, and he's been playing for several years. But with Tobias, I've looked at his IFPA numbers, and mainly almost every single tournament he plays in is in Germany. I mean, he's been to the Belgian Open. He's been to Dutch Pinmasters and a few other European championships. But mainly he concentrates in Germany. That's how much pinball there is there, that here he is a great player, but there's so much pinball activity that he can propel himself with his excellent play to 45th in the world. Tell me about Tobias. Well, he's sort of one of the young enthusiasts in the hobby. And he has a young family, so traveling far abroad is probably not always possible because his wife doesn't play pinball. So she does support him in a hobby, but still it's difficult for him to be away. He's a passionate dad, he's got a new baby now. And he says he prefers organizing tournaments and make sure they run very well and playing them, which is incredibly difficult. I always fail my game if I TDing in a tournament So yes and that how the whole whooper farm idea and structure come about so that people don't have to travel, because obviously, well, although Europe is a lot smaller by territory than the U.S. and Canada combined, it's still sometimes international travel, it's still a long journey, So with this idea of combined tournaments within weekends and long weekends is to make it worth for people traveling. Yeah. And also, obviously, because for the World Championship and the qualification of the World Championship, we have to compete with the North Americans who have hundreds major, well, biggish tournaments every weekend. We sort of thought, well, we may as well play many more tournaments within one weekend. and to allow European players to be able to qualify not only through the country sports, but also through the main ranking. Yeah. So just for example, the Olympics now has qualification sports, automatic qualification sports for each country, for each European country. So any country can send two people, and they will automatically get registered for that tournament. and that's so we get people like Peter Anderson, Frank Bonner, Daniele Acciari, Roberto Leventi, people that come to the tournament because they know it is going to be a high ranking, lots of points for that tournament because of the players that are involved. You can add Jeff Teolis once this COVID thing to that list as a sad representation from Canada. Yeah, we would love to. Well, we had Lauren Clark Frehley at the Olympics last year. We did. But the Olympics, no, they were in midsummer. They were in midsummer last year. We also, of course, had Cale George because he lived in the Netherlands for a long time. So he was a regular attender of the tournament tournaments. With all these great tournaments in Germany, that's where JBL Pinball comes in because you have streamed several of them, and not just in Germany, but all over Europe. And let's talk about the greatest stream of all time. IFPA 16, Johannes versus Daniele, one of the greatest comebacks ever. Just back and forth, amazing play from both people. And not just the finals, too, but leading up to that as well, Peter Anderson, who you mentioned earlier, he had some great competitions. That had to be one of the highlights for JDL Pinball. It was indeed. It was a great build-up. We were asked by Josh Sharp. I know Josh is a very good friend of yours, Jeff. Yes, Josh is fine. In fact, he just said to say hello to you because I'm talking to him very soon, and he said to say hi to Dina and Jim, so there you go. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. And he asked us to do IFPA. Well, he basically asked the tournament, the country directors of Europe, if anyone could stream in Italy, because Italy didn't have a streamer that could do the event. And a few of the country directors put our names forward. Josh asked us. We absolutely jumped at the chance, spent lots of money on new equipment. We flew it all down to Italy. Well, half of it we flew and half of it was taken by some of the great players in their cars. And we had a wonderful, well, two weekends. One for the pre-IFPA tournaments where we got to actually measure out everything and test it all. And then the event itself, IFPA 16, was amazing. So if that's one of the highlights, how did it all begin for streaming? And why did you pick pinball? I know you both love pinball, but there are a lot of other sports that you could have covered. You certainly have a passion for gaming. Why was it pinball and how did it begin? We fell into it from when I moved to Germany. We started to get involved in the German pinball scene as players. So we went to some tournaments and then I volunteered to help put together the German pinball opening Gladbeck in 2016. That was with a group of people who worked tirelessly to put together around about 120 pinball machines that were recovered from people's barns, people's cellars, people's attics, all over this part of Germany. And we spent three months working two nights a week, changing light bulbs, changing rubbers, getting the machines into almost tournament-ready state. I won't say perfect. And about two weeks before the event, I said, wouldn't it be nice if we could stream this event? And everybody looked at me as if I've got two heads and said, who's got time to do that? So basically, I talked to Dina, then volunteered to do it, went online, learned a bit about OBS and Logitech cameras, and bought a microphone and a camera pole, and we streamed the GPO in Gladbeck as our very first event in 2016. So that's where it all began. And that was so, one, enjoyable and, two, successful in its own way that we just built from there. And everybody then said, oh, will you come and do this? Will you come and do this? And it built from strength to strength. And, Dina, I've seen you move the gear around at events, and the gear that you've talked about being expensive, you keep adding to it. In fact, you've got some great cameras. We saw it just recently at Pinball Alps, in fact. Yes. Well, this is actually quite a nice hobby for your husband to have because you never run out of present ideas. So pretty much like the last three years, every single birthday and Christmas, I will buy something either pinball or pinball streaming related for Jim as a present, which is absolutely wonderful because obviously everything that doesn't have a power cord is not considered of any value by Jim. All the other presents, they just disappear, never get used. And, you know, everything to do with streaming is always incredibly welcome. So, yes, I'm pretty grateful, darling, for your hobby. So, yeah, well, the gear we have now is pretty awesome. But, Dina, you've got hobbies, too. And I'm saying this because I'm watching you as we're looking on Skype right now. And the first thing I noticed in the background is a little drum kit, an electric, I don't know, Roland drum kit or something. And I said, do you play? And you've picked up this hobby of playing drums. No wonder you love The Who. Keith Moon, I mean, by the way, on that kit, put on your headphones, plug in Who Are You by The Who, and just listen to Keith fill the gaps with fills here and there. Because I think he was getting bored, and he's just like, I'm going to go here, I'm going to go here. And you can do it too on that kit. It's so much fun to do. Try it. But anyway, so you picked up drumming? Well, I've been in music my entire life. I started playing the classical piano age of five. and sort of I have a classical pianist training. So that's why you like Rick Wakeman of Yes. Well, yes, it was a perfect combination. I was about seven and already into classical music when my wonderful uncle gave me two cassette tapes. I got a new cassette tape recorder and received two cassette tapes from my uncle and one of them was King Arthur by Rick Wakeman. So for a pianist, sort of in the impressionable age, to hear the first opening line made me a prog fan for absolutely ever. So, yes, I've been into progressive rock music for pretty much my entire life. And so the second hobby, which I am responsible for organizing, are going to various rock concerts. And, well, we've seen The How many times, we've seen Yes many times, we've seen Rick Wakeman a few times, have a signed copy of his printed music, and, you know, sort of all that fun stuff. And, yes, at some point I decided to learn drums. It didn't last long because work always gets in the way of little pleasures in life. I have come across several great pinball players who are drummers, and I have to think it's the hand-eye coordination, it's the timing. it's the juggling, if you will, of maybe multi-balls. It's, you know, the seeing more things at once. And drumming is a great skill set, I believe, to help you with pinball. Not only, it's fun too, especially when you love all this music, which actually makes me wonder. I don't know much about Russia. And you said your uncle gave you a couple of cassette tapes. Was this music and the 70s rock music that you love so much, was this readily available in Russia? No. So basically everything, well, at Soviet times, Everything that came from a Western country was pretty much banned. The only band that was really popular in the Soviet Union was The Beatles, because it was not to be sort of hidden. Well, they sang back in the USSR, so, I mean, there you go. Yeah, exactly. There are rumors that they actually gave a secret concert in Moscow, somewhere in the club in Moscow, in the prime of their life. I don't pretty believe that, but I've seen Paul McCartney did give a concert on the Red Square. Yes, I've seen that. Yes, in the early 2000s. And if you see the footage, man age 50 plus, stand there for two and a half hours crying. Oh, for sure. It's one of the most moving piece of television that I've ever watched. So, yes, Beatles and the Soviet people is one and everything. But the other bands were not known. And the only reason my uncle knows about them is because he studied in St. Petersburg. And it was kind of more attached to the Western world, even in the 70s. But obviously my musical time starts after the breakdown of the Soviet Union So things were readily available But obviously the bootleg copies So for the first 10 years of my life I collected all my music which I didn't have any rights to own. But since of course, all my favorite, all my favorites. Okay, Jim, time for a little rock Russia trivia. Yeah. So the Beatles, that was a rumor. They didn't actually play there from what everything I've heard. But certainly, like you say, popular. Who was the first rock star to play in the Soviet Union? Do either of you know? A little trivia here on Pinball Profile. First rock star to play in the Soviet Union? It was 1979. And there's a little bit of pinball in there in the sense that this person was in the movie, Tommy. Elton John. It was Sir Elton John, absolutely. And then the first Western rock star to play there, for all of our North American listeners, was in 1987, Billy Joel. Alright, back to pinball. Enough trivia.
    21:47
    So the equipment on JDL Pinball has grown and grown. The number of streams have grown and in fact you've got an event coming up very, very soon. August 22nd 23rd at the aforementioned Bulls and Balls in Fulda. What's going on there? Well, we have actually just done a tournament last weekend. So we run a tournament Friday well, three tournaments Friday and Saturday. A Swiss mode, a group match play and a five-strike knockout, and that was limited to 25 players. It was done as effectively a trial to see how good the distance was, how many machines we could use, and the best tournament format to be able to take some tournaments forward over the next few months while we are still under the COVID guidelines. And it worked extremely well. 25 people. Bulls and Bulls has a huge capacity. It's about 1,000 square meters. 1,000 square meters, 57 pinball machines. We used basically one machine out of three as a general rule. So one machine switched on, two switched off, next one on. Okay. And the feeling of everybody was that of safety. The distance you would apply between you and your partner player was fine. There was no crowding within the halls that made anybody feel unsafe. We had, of course, temperature testing at the door. Really? Yes, and recording temperature names and addresses and telephone numbers. Oh, good. We had hand sanitizers everywhere. So we had the distancing rules. We were looking basically for hot spots. and the one we found, this is perhaps interesting for any TD who is thinking of organising a tournament during these times, the most difficult one we found was the match play score entry and the display of the players for the next round. The players would naturally crowd round, you know, a big TV monitor on the wall, so it's not as if the light huddled in a corner, but the tendency was people to be so keen to see their name and where they were to not be as conscious of the distance as they were for the rest of the weekend. So basically the 22nd is a meeting of our little inner circle, which will be discussing this trial tournament to see what we need to do going forward and what we can actually put in place for the next tournament, which we're planning in September. Now, on the 22nd, we will have Johannes there, so we will be doing some stream of demonstration play and things, but it's unlikely to be a tournament. The tournament was actually last weekend. We did stream that and I'm just doing video editing at the moment to get that onto YouTube. That I look forward to watching and good on Bulls and Balls for that extra precautions, the temperature taking, the distancing, the one out of three machines. The one thing I was thinking about adding and when you're playing multiplayer games, you know, usually when you're qualifying for these events, if it's a herb score or a pump and dump, you play your machine by yourself and someone else goes down. good chance for you to then wipe down the machine, the lock bar, all those kind of things. Well, in multiplayers, you've got four people on a machine. You play ball one, the next person goes, next person, next person goes. I'm wondering if we are going to have these tournaments, if it is safer to just play your entire game and then let the next person go. Record your scores. Would that help with social distancing and tournaments in COVID? I think it would probably help, but I think it would also restrict the competitive side to it. I think we found from last weekend that four-player games are not right. I think two-player games are okay. Four-player games, you get the other three players congregating too close together. They weren't congregating that much, but Jeff is right. It's the touching of the gear and sort of stepping aside and the next one comes in and where do you step? And, you know, lots of players in the four-play match actually put masks on. Wearing masks all the way through the game. Yes. But on the two-player games, lots of people didn't. So it wasn't a requirement for the tournament because we did have enough distance to be able to stay away safely. but some of the people well either work in hospitals or have some kind of medical conditions so it was up to them to choose to wear a mask but during the four player game definitely more than half of the people wore masks during the game which was an indication of whether people were feeling comfortable or not and I know this is a bit of a mute point I don't expect the IFPA to put competition back in place until beginning of next year I think that's almost certain. I think what we're trying to do in Germany is just try and maybe push a little bit to see if we can get something there in competitive pinball, even though it is in a very limited form. But people have to be comfortable. People have to feel safe. And if they don't, then they don't play.
    26:57
    It's up to us to try and create that. But we would never force anybody to be there, of course. That's purely by choice. I like hearing these precautions. I myself am weary if IFPA started tomorrow and there's no vaccine and masks aren't mandatory. Boy, as much as I want to play and as much as I want to see people, I would have difficulty. But I saw what you did at Pinball Alps. I like hearing what you've done at Bulls and Balls, and I'm going to see it again on the 22nd. Those make people like me feel a lot more comfortable. And I was really glad to hear you talk about the temperatures and the contact tracing. That's very important. But you mentioned that, yeah, probably IFPA, we won't see that kind of competitive endorsed tournament until maybe 2021. Well, with that, IFPA 17 got moved. It was originally supposed to be in May. Then it was supposed to be in November in Florida. Now it's being pushed to next year. Let's put it this way. Even if the borders were open, people would come from all over the world to the U.S. and they wouldn't be able to leave because not too many countries are accepting people from the U.S. right now during COVID. That being said, 17 is moving. So that means IFPA 18, which was supposed to be in Germany at Freddy's Pinball Paradise, that is now obviously going to be postponed until 2022. That's unfortunate because I know you were looking forward to seeing so many of the world's best, like you did in Italy last year, come to Germany. Yeah, we will be there at the IFPA 18 anyway, whatever year it is. We will be streaming that. We were also asked to stream the European Championship this year. the EPC which we were scheduled to do in Belgium we're expecting now that to be moved by a year and so therefore we will be doing the EPC in 2021 we seem to have plenty of things to keep us busy at the moment we we are being asked to do various things at Pinball Universe and elsewhere so we're just finding other avenues as well as Tournament Pinball which we love just to keep the cobwebs off the streaming equipment. Well, actually moving the FP18 to 2022 is probably not a bad idea anyway because the technological leap in two years' time is probably going to allow us to have like space shuttle cameras or, you know, like really high-tech, like really fancy stuff. Sure. So, yeah, don't mind. I mean, the sort of positive side of COVID, if there is one, is that the technology is developing a lot faster now because communication in these times, well, telecommunication in particular, is incredibly important and part of lots of businesses. So product development in that respect, I think, is going to wheeze away. So, yes, we're waiting. You know, that's a good point because that's how we got to do that Zoom call at Pinball Alps. And I was fortunate enough to be on JDL Pinball with you. So that's too bad about the European Pinball Championship in Belgium being moved to next year. But I know JDL will do another great job just like IFP18, whenever that is. I did see you at the last European Pinball Championship in Denmark last October. And you finally got to just play and have some fun. Yeah! Amazing. We don't often go to pinball tournaments without streaming equipment, but it's actually very nice when we do. And, you know, we met a really, really nice Canadian guy there. I'm not sure if you know him. I'll have him killed. Who was it?
    30:36
    It was nice to meet both of you, and that was good. And again, we were talking about some of these great players in Europe, but specifically in Germany. We mentioned Tobias. We have seen what Johannes Ostermeyer has done, a number one player in the world, a world champion. and now he gets to keep that title for another year. But the guy, I can't remember what stream it was. I think it had to be your Ho Ho Ho event. You had him on the stream, and I'm fascinated by this young player. He's 23rd in the world, Paul Englert. Please tell me about Paul. Paul is just continuing to develop at a great pace He was in our tournament last week He won one of the tournaments And is he 14 years old He 13 He's 13 years old. He's quite small in stature. And probably when you saw him in last year's tournaments, he was still using a box to stand on,
    31:28
    which, of course, everybody then underestimates his capability and he wipes them out. He is an absolutely tremendous player. He's got game knowledge. He's got flipper skills you would not believe. And he is so mature for his age and matured even more since six months ago when we last saw him. It was a real, real joy to be in the tournament with last weekend. Yes, and he also is kind of interested in the technical side of the streaming as well. His dad supports him in that. So Paul has a YouTube channel called Pinsheep, where he demonstrates a lot of gameplay on the newest turns. And, you know, the video I got to watch, he got like an amazing score on the Ninja Turtles, like in one game, one hour, 20 minutes, one game. So he's going to develop to a nice media person at some point. But we are really lucky because Johannes is also an excellent character. He's awesome. His skills we all know from the IFBA 16 World Championship, and he'll continue at that level. He's just finished his final exams, so he's now moving to college. We, as JDL Pinball, have actually given him a streaming kit to try and encourage him to put some streams online. He's not plucked up courage or had the time yet to do that. He's partying, darling. Let him be. We were all there once. You're right, Dina. Although, you know, that could be something new for JDL because I know Johannes is going to school for languages. You could have him do it in several languages. JDL could be number one across the world. He's going to study Latin. Oh, just Latin? Oh, all right.
    33:19
    That's his main subject. Maybe we could branch out there and put Latin subtitles on all of our streams. That might work. Well, you have to sort of be dressed as a centurion and, you know, like Roman dress and, yeah. Riding a chariot. Yes. Okay. I know you get excited whenever you get to stream the Game of Thrones because of your daughter, Kate. And she did some great work on that. Yeah, that was, I was hoping you were going to link into that story because my daughter, Kate, is the female voice on the pinball machine, not in the series. and the pinball machine Game of Thrones. So she's the girl that says House Baratheon, et cetera, at the beginning of a game. And tells you off for being such a bully. Yeah, you're being too rough. She tells me that most days. And basically this came about with a meeting with Steve Richie at the Dutch pinball tournament about, what did it be, four years ago? Yeah, maybe 15, 16, somewhere around there, yeah. And basically, Stern were looking for an English-speaking voice, an English-sounding voice, who was involved in pinball. And Kate, at the time, was the number one player in England. She was involved in organizing league meetings and very much in the UK scene. And so she fitted the bill. She has a lovely speaking voice. And she sounds great on the recording. They took her into a studio in England and recorded that online back with Chicago. So that's our other claim to fame is that, yeah, my daughter is the female voice of the Game of Thrones. Nobody should believe this story. I know it's true. It's very exciting. I'll give you another bit to that story, whether you want to use it. Yeah. When she visited Pin Lab, well, she's an accountant, and she was doing work in Denmark. And she visited Pin Lab, and they took her into the place. There was a Game of Thrones pinball machine right in the center. So they'd moved it out and they asked her to stand in front of the machine saying the name of the houses while they were pressing the flip button. And they made a video recording of it. And she was treated like a real VIP for the evening. Very nice. That's very cool. I'm glad they liked her voice because otherwise they would have had her walk the hall and go, shame, shame, shame.
    35:49
    Awesome. The last thing I wanted to talk to you about was there's been a big change when it comes to streaming, whether it's Twitch, whether it's uploading on YouTube, and it's obviously copyrighted music. If you are using this in your streams, the audio might be taken out because of the copyrighted music. But you kind of have a way around that, don't you, with JDL Pinball? We purchased something called a gamer license in Germany, which allows us to broadcast background music. and when you're streaming pinball then you always get that you get the ACDC machines you get Iron Maiden you get Beatles is the worst one as soon as the Beatles pinball machine starts a copyright block gets put on your video so the gamer license is the way to block that now when you get a copyright claim the video immediately cannot be monetized but we don't monetize at the moment anyway We then do a counterclaim, which we give them the gamer license, then a 30-day period for that to be accepted. And generally, then it gets wiped out, so the copyright disappears. But it's slightly annoying. We can also get it from background music from a bar, particularly in Bulls and Balls and things, where particularly late at night, there'll be loud music playing, and it'll be picked up by the microphones. It's impossible not to. And then the next thing you know, the video has a copyright block. With some embarrassing music attached to it, like, you know, like Pazzi Disco sort of thing, which, you know, I don't want to be seen dead next to. Never mind. Wait a second. I love The Who, but I also love disco. Hold on, Dina. You've got to embrace it all, all right? Especially as a drummer, the percussion in disco is, I mean, once you start playing that hi-hat, you'll be thinking some disco beats, I'm telling you right now. You're not going to win this one, Deft. I tried.
    37:49
    Wasn't there a Sister Disco by The Who? Yeah, but it's the proper music from the 70s. It's not something from 2019.
    38:00
    Fair enough. Written electronically, not by a human being, to make lots of money and not to be a great musician. The point is, you're right. I mean, music, and does that include things that happen in movies, whether it's not even music but it's actual lines in movies, would that count as the copyright? I don't think you get caught on lines in music. You might for the theme tune of a film or something. But they are getting stricter and stricter. The copyright claims we've had in the last five years of being streaming were probably only two or three over the first four years of that. But recently they tend to happen more often. Your microphone has become better. We also do have much better audio equipment. So the game sound is something I've always thought as important in a stream. And, of course, the better the equipment is for recording that, the more likely it is that the tunes and things are going to be picked up. So, yeah, you're probably right. It's probably more to do with equipment than rules. Well, no. So the filters and the IE behind recognizing the copyrighted music have become better and better. And we are kind of disadvantaged anyway because we have the German IP address, and Germany is incredibly strict on copyright protection. So some music, well, some videos on YouTube from other countries that are not as strict on rules, dispute the copyright claim, their video will not be played in Germany with a line across the screen saying this creator doesn't have the GEMA license. So it is, and it has been like that for quite a number of years. So, yes, well, we're all in favor of protecting somebody else's property. We have no issue at all paying money back to the music creators because that's how music works. If you don't pay, then you don't get the music, and we're very much in favor of having the music. Okay, let's recap what I've learned here on this pinball profile. You're very responsible when it comes to copyrighted music, yet Dina grew up with bootlegged cassettes.
    40:19
    I have replaced every single item that I've ever owned. I've also learned what partner company means, and that if you work for a company, you'll find your partner. Okay, I've got that. Find a partner in any company you like. That works, yeah. Not for you anymore. That's the way. And once again, disco rules. That's all I'm going to say. We'll just leave it at that.
    40:45
    Dina, Jim, you know how much I enjoyed this, and I look forward to seeing you on stream again on JDL Pinball and more so even seeing you in person when that day comes. I look forward to that. Me too. So, yeah, see you soon. Stay safe, and thanks to everybody as well. And you're welcome to Germany anytime after this old madness. I'll be there. Thanks very much, and we'll talk to you soon. Take care. Bye-bye. Bye. This has been your Pinball Profile. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com. Check us out on Twitter and Instagram. We also have a great Facebook group, and you can email us, pinballprofile at gmail.com. I'm Jeff Teel. Goodbye, Sister Disco, with your flashy trash cans. Goodbye sister disco And to your clubs and your trams